MITCHELL — On Tuesday night, you could find Sarah Sebert starting for the Mitchell Kernels girls basketball team – scoring 11 crucial points along the way to the Kernels winning a fourth-straight game 46-42 over Harrisburg.
On Wednesday, she was at the Corn Palace on the court during halftime of the Dakota Wesleyan men’s game – performing a dance routine as part of her team with A.H.hhh Dance. Last Tuesday, she was in Alexandria performing at halftime of the Hanson vs. Howard boys game.
Sarah Sebert, a senior at Mitchell High School, comes from a long line of dancers.
“Both of my sisters did A.H.hhh Dance too, so they were like, ‘I don’t know if you’re going to be able to make it work,'” Sebert said. “That was a choice I had to make, and that was a sacrifice I going to have to do to balance the two … it was really hard to make the decision to do both.”
When she got to high school, Sebert decided she didn’t have to choose between dancing and basketball – and credits both of her coaches for helping make that decision possible.
“It was really weird my freshman year because it’s a halftime performance team,” Sebert said. “But between Anne Huber, my A.H.hhh Dance coach, and (Kernels girls head basketball coach Cole Knippling), they do a really good job of figuring out when I can perform and when I can get out of practice early to go perform or go to practice.”
She has basketball practice after school and then Sundays and Wednesdays she fits in dance practice – with halftime routines all around the area mixed in.
Sebert’s said part of the reason she continued to do basketball was to maintain a special connection with her grandfather, Lou Sebert.
“I was the only one of my grandpa’s granddaughters that did basketball,” she said. “It’s kind of our special bond that we have.”
Sarah will be continuing her dance career next year as part of the newly formed Dakota Wesleyan University squad. She will be out on the basketball court this Friday at Sioux Falls Lincoln.